Moose (20140125) more owl searching with Kerri

She is like an addict, this girl. Ever since she lost her photo's of the NPO, we have been attempting to find another so she can replace her shots, so we are on the road again. So we headed out to a newer area close to before to find the elusive bird but no luck. We did have a little early morning activity with a pileated woodpecker, then a red fox, and a mile later a second red fox. We then found another pileated, but it was a long way off so we were not getting images on electronic devices, just with our "grey matter"! We finally managed to find a pair of moose lying down. With the type of weather we have had, cold and lots of snow, it is not uncommon to find moose bedded right down in the middle of their food supply.

Another couple of miles up the road we found some more of these big herbivores.

As we stood and watch this pair, we were able to spot 6 more moose, some of the bulls still had antlers, indicating a pretty healthy specimen.

Another big cow shot, they move this deep snow like it is not even there, or so it seems.

On a side road we found a single pair of whitewinged crossbills. They didn't hang around very long, so the shot that I am posting is definitely sub par.

It was starting to remind me of Noah and his Ark we were finding two of everything and not a lot else, due to the strong winds that were getting stronger.  We decided to "pack it in" for the day. We swung past the new and old NPO hot spots and decided to take one little detour on the way home. We spied a Northern Shrike hunting in a field.

We were shooting right into the light so the image is poor. Three times it hovered and dove.

On the third attempt it caught a mouse/vole and carried it off. Unfortunately I didn't get any shots of the combination.

On the final part of our drive we found  Rough Legged Hawk being harassed by a group of ravens. That wrapped up up our day, successful overall, but hampered by the wind.
Turbo